Office in the Living Room
I used to write in a corner of the living room. Until two years ago, when our roof started leaking, the air conditioner quit, and the furnace died. Since we had to get a loan for repairs, we decided to go big or go home with a complete remodel and an office addition for me. With a door I could close. We hired a plumber, electrician and carpenter. The carpenter built the addition and got it in the dry for us. Since we’re pretty handy and were up to our eyeballs already with the remodel, we decided to do the soffit, exterior trim, and complete interior of the addition ourselves to cut costs.
My office interior and the remodel were finished last year. We still plan to convert a small bedroom into a laundry room. Right now, our washer and dryer is in the hallway between the main living area and the master bedroom. It’s loud when we’re trying to visit or watch TV in the family room and when we’re trying to sleep. Once it’s done, we’ll rest.
New Office with my own door
This week, I was in my office trying to write my current deadline book. I say trying because my husband was outside my window on a ladder installing the soffit and trim. I tried to get into the scene in my head, but he kept
distracting me with thoughts of what a good man he is, how hard he works, and how cute he looked in his cargo shorts. I ended up going outside and telling him I couldn’t work because of the cute guy on the ladder. He said, “Tell him to come around here. I could use some help.” Did I mention he’s humble too.
I decided to work a fictionalized version of the episode into the third book in my current series. It won’t work in the one I’m writing now, since my rodeo hero is working with my occupational therapist heroine after a traumatic brain injury due to a bull wreck. He can’t really get on a ladder just yet. But it will work for book three.
That got me to thinking about all the inspiration I’ve gathered from real life and put into my books. When my husband answered the call to preach after sixteen years of marriage, I was blind-sided and felt terribly unworthy. That inspired, White Roses, about a florist who falls for the widowed pastor and doesn’t feel up to par compared to his angelic deceased wife. It ended up being my first published book and turned into a three book 
series in Romance and Rose Bud, AR. Both are real small towns about twenty to thirty miles from where I live. Since all of my characters from the series kissed at the Romance Waterfall, I got my writer bud to take a pic of me and the cute distracting guy too. He was so uncomfortable kissing me for the camera, but he did it for me.
When our son was small, we took him to the Arkansas State Fair. There, I saw a cowboy to the bone wearing Wranglers, Justins, and a Stetson holding hands with a young woman in a pin-striped business suit and suede boots. Wondering how they met and what they had in common led me to a scenario of a bull rider and a city girl ad exec terrified of bulls. Add in the fact that I worked the concession stand at our small town rodeo as a teen while my dad announced and I married a Texan, and Rodeo Dust was born. Which turned into an eight book rodeo series set in Aubrey, Dallas, and Fort Worth.
A few years ago, our adult Sunday School teacher shared during our class that he’d had a brain aneurysm several years ago. His recounting of being at work and feeling something pop at the base of his neck, then the worst headache ever, and then waking in the hospital three days later after emergency surgery found nothing to repair was supposed to show us that God still does miracles. It did. But while he taught the rest of the class, I was busy writing notes about a bull rider with an aneurysm moving home to decide whether to have risky surgery and learning the girl he left behind happens to live next door.
My Guys with Texas Mom 2017
Just for fun, I made the heroine a vet since I toyed with the idea of that career path when I was a kid. Until I learned vets have to euthanize pets. Then I decided to become a hairdresser. But that’s a whole other story. The series of four books started in Aubrey with Reuniting with the Cowboy and transitioned to Bandera, Texas. Bandera is close to where my father-in-law’s ranch is Medina and where we’ve spent countless vacations.
Speaking of the ranch, my father-in-law went to Heaven eleven years ago. We still make visits to see his wife, we call her Texas Mom, every other year. For the series I’m currently writing, a conversation we had a few years ago about how dry it was there and struggling ranches inspired a new three book series. Each is set on a ranch in Medina, which is of course based on the family ranch. From the river running across the back of the property to visits to the Apple Store. Hill Country Redemption, book 1 releases in April 2020.
My editor pointed out that readers would think The Apple Store was a computer store when my characters talk about going there, so I added detail. Medina is known as the Apple Capital of Texas. The Apple Store sells homemade baked goods, preserves, snacks, and gift items. Every time we visit Medina, we buy Pumpkin Apple Bread, Apple Peach Pecan Preserves, and Cinnamon and Sugar Roasted Pecans from the Apple Store. So of course my characters do too.
The Apple Store
Years ago, my father-in-law headed up the Apple Festival. It was 104 in July and there I was riding around with him on his golf cart with the cowhide seat. I tried fried rattlesnake and it’s still the best meat I’ve ever eaten. More tender than a chicken tender and almost flaky like fish, with a sweet taste. Yum. I ended up overheating and sitting in the river fully clothed. Maybe those memories will go in future books. That was one of the last Apple Festivals since they discontinued it a few years later. Maybe one of my future heroines can resurrect it.
What inspires you to be productive or get creative? Answer to get in the drawing for a copy of Sweetheart Reunion, my two in one title with Tina Radcliffe. Deadline: September 21st.
Award winning author, Shannon Taylor Vannatter writes contemporary Christian cowboy romance and has over a dozen published titles. A romance reader since her teens, she hopes to entertain Christian women and plant seeds in the non-believer’s heart as she demonstrates that love doesn’t conquer all—Jesus does. She gleans fodder for her fiction in rural Arkansas where she spent her teenage summers working the concession stand with her rodeo announcing dad and married a Texan who morphed into a pastor. In her spare time, she loves hanging out with her husband and son, flea marketing, and doing craft projects.
Hi Shannon! Thanks for the insightful blog about the real life inspiration behind your stories. At the high school where I taught, the Spanish teacher had a brain aneurysm. I was her mentor teacher and over the 20 years we taught together and attended conferences together, she shared a lot about what happened. My inspiration are my granddaughters. They love that I write stories for them and create photo books with my story. The stories mention their names and include their pictures and pictures of family members. My latest creation is Oma’s and Opa’s Magic Kingdom, which includes a King and Queen, two handsome knights (my grandsons) and two adorable busy princesses (my granddaughters). Since I taught journalism and creative writing, this retired teacher needs some creative outlet when she isn’t too exhausted chasing a precocious two year old and a non stop talking six year old. Both girls have a vivid imagination and give me lots to write about. Book 1 was Squirrel Everywhere. The girls want another book in the series. Love the pictures of your office. Best wishes and enjoy your weekend.
Ironically I thought an Apple store was just that a store with Apples and other apple items and other fruits. figured the area had lots of apple orchards.
different things inspire me. (like getting a new second hand lawn mower and looking at a lawn desperate for mowing, looks much better now). Or the guy who came saying he could garden for a cost which was more than a third of what most people charge (actually even more than that for what most charge) and didn’t like me saying no and told me the yard was a disgrace. I already knew that but it did motivate me to get some of it done. Its just hard when you have health issues. I also can’t afford to pay someone (not that I would have had him back I didn’t know him but just felt he wasn’t someone I wanted in the yard).
I have lots of scrapbooking supplies (ex creative memories consultant) and as I don’t have much money I have used some of the small albums to make a gift. Like my friend who’s cats I looked after for 8 months. I wanted to make an album of photos I had taken of them for her when she left so she would remember me! It just cost me printing a few photo’s as I had everything else.
I’m looking forward to reading about that good-looking distraction on the ladder. I started quilting when I retired. My inspiration comes from looking at other people’s quilts through magazines, online, and my local quilt group. I need to get inspired today and start quilting the dragon quilt I’m making for my good-looking distraction.
Shannon! Thanks so much for this post. So much inspiration. Two years ago, our house was flooded, from the inside, by a dog who wasn’t ours. It inspired me to write a manual, devotion, short story? Not sure what it will be, about our experience. The title is: How we survived a flood by a dog who wasn’t ours and how you can too. God was all in it! From the time I came home and found the mess, to when we found out how extensive the repairs would be, to it finally being completed the weekend before Christmas. A variation of it is in a story I am working on now as well. Thanks for this post, Shannon! a cowboy to the bone wearing Wranglers, Justins, and a Stetson holding hands with a young woman in a pin-striped business suit and suede boots-I want to read Rodeo Dust! Your books sound great. Can’t wait to check them out.
What a fun post! They always say truth is stranger than fiction. You could get so much inspiration just from everyday life!
Thank you so much for sharing your inspiration stories with us! I have the giveaway book, so no need to enter me😍!
I really enjoyed seeing where you got your inspiration for your different books. I get inspiration from going for walks and listening to songs.
What a fun post!! One of my Aunt and Uncle’s had an apple orchard for years in NW GA. I love fried apple pies!! I don’t even know all of the varieties they had, and they made apple cider, apple butter, apple sauce, dried apples. We’d go up to visit in October and bring apples back with us. One year, we emptied one suitcase and filled it with beans, a train case and filled it with Vidalia onions. You never knew what we might bring home!! Cooler weather would help me get going with the Christmas cards we need to make!!
I am always inspired in what ever I do.
Thanks for sharing your sweet story…..loved it!
Sharon, thanks for sharing the interesting things that inspire your stories. I know how real life things end up in fictional stories.
Thank you Shannon for this wonderful post I get my inspiration from my children I love canning our homegrown vegetables because I not only put food on my table but also my children Thank you for the chance to win this amazing book!
That’s awesome about the photo books, Renate. Your grandchildren will have those to treasure for a lifetime. What a fun grandmother you are. My friend makes photo books for her grand daughter, but just with pictures, no stories.
Hey Ausjenny, Medina is known as the Apple Capitol of Texas. The store has so many yummy things. It’s probably a good thing we don’t live there. That sounds like a rude gardener and I’m glad you didn’t hire him. I always wanted to scrapbook, but I never was organized or had enough time to do it. I buy pretty boxes to keep my photos in and I’m happy that way. They’re not organized at all, but it’s fun to pull out the boxes and dig through them.
I love quilts. We have 6 that I’ve collected over the years. I have one made by one grandmother. She used scraps from our old clothing. It’s my favorite because I can pick out Daddy’s shirts, Mama’s dresses, and my shirts. I have another where I sewed the top by hand and my other grandmother quilted it. 3 store bought. One that I won in a drawing that’s handmade – and I never win anything, so I was tickled to win a quilt. We also have a patriotic one that a lady in our church had her sister-in-law make for us. And it’s almost quilt weather. Yay!!!!
None of mine are fancy or patterned. So I’m always impressed when people make the ones with patterns. I’ll have to google a dragon quilt since you’ve made me curious.
That sounds like quite a story, Sally. I’m so glad God got you through it and that you decided to write about it. Rodeo Dust is available for free on my website. Sign up for my newsletter there and you’ll get your copy.
Hey Susan. There’s a lot more that I’ve gotten from real life. But I didn’t want to make the blog forever long. I worked the Apple Festival, trying rattlesnake, and the overheating then sitting in the river into a proposal for a new series I’ve been working on. I was kind of stuck and realized that incident would fit in the story.
Hey Paula Marie, I use random.org to pick winners. So if you win, I’ll see what you don’t have from my bookshelf.
Walks are the greatest, Lori. If I ever get stuck on a book and it’s not ridiculously hot, I’ll walk up our gravel road. By the time I finish, I’ve usually got the story worked out.
That sounds like so much fun. My grandparents used to have a peach orchard in the field where we live now, Trudy. I used to walk the orchard with a paring knife. I’d pick and peel and eat as I walked, with juice running down my elbows until I couldn’t eat another bite. So good. They were the best peaches I’ve ever eaten and I’ve never found any as good. Not even in other orchards. After my grandfather died, my grandmother tried to take care of it herself and ended falling and breaking her arm. By then some of the trees were dying anyway. Her kids, including my dad talked her into letting them push the rest of the trees over with a tractor. So it’s just a field now and our house is in the middle of it. I love the history and memories of where I live, but I miss the peaches. Even though my kitchen is coffee themed since my husband and I are both fanatics, I have bushel basket with some fake peaches on top of my cabinets and a couple of peach pictures on the wall.
Even though my books are set in Texas, I need to work the peach orchard into one of them in the future.
That’s awesome Kim. If I’m not inspired or in the mood to do whatever task I take on, I make a mess. Or it’s really hard. Like sewing. I love to sew curtain toppers, bedspreads, and comforters. But if I’m not in the mood to sew and I do it anyway, I end up ripping out more stitches than I keep.
Hey Jackie, it’s really fun using memories and things that have happened in my books. It helps me not to forget.
Hey Merrillee, I bet you have lots of fictionalized real life happenings.
Hey Sarah, canning is getting to be a lost art. Both of my grandmothers canned. Out of their combined 10 kids, two of my aunts, one on each side still can. I love when they give me canned stuff. Yum.
That is so sweet of you!❤️
I stay busy and productive so I don’t think about all the things that bother me.
Just trying to be fair.
That’s a very good plan, Lucy. My husband is an freethinkers and worrier, so I try to keep him busy.
How fun. Thanks for sharing.
Thanks for reading, Priscils.
I’ve read the book! It’s awesome <3
Thank you, Natalya. I appreciate the comment.